The discussion of any work, publications, sales, or activity anywhere in this submission, including in any documents submitted with this application, shall not be taken as an admission that any such work constitutes prior art. The discussion of any activity, work, or publication herein is not an admission that such activity, work, or publication existed or was known in any particular jurisdiction.
High quality molecular and cellular sample preparations are the foundation for effective technology validation as well as for meaningful biological and clinical research and for various clinical and other applications. In vitro samples that closely represent their in vivo characteristics could potentially benefit a wide range of molecular and cellular applications. Handling, characterization, culturing, and visualization of cells or other biologically or chemically active materials (such as beads coated with various biological molecules) has become increasingly valued in the fields of drug discovery, disease diagnoses and analysis, and a variety of other therapeutic and experimental work.
Mammalian cell culture is an essential aspect of medical and biological research and development and ultimately treatment. However, most current practices are labor/resource intensive, not amenable to process control, cannot address cellular length scales, and prevent long-term continuous real-time monitoring or observation. Furthermore, current cell culture practices have not provided fully satisfactory solutions to the challenges of maintaining effective solid aggregates of cells in culture.
Advances have been made by combining microfabrication and microfluidic technologies with cell culture during the past decade; nevertheless, there is not yet a compact device effectively providing the same functionality as traditional cell culture.
Some recent publications and/or patent documents that discuss various strategies related to cell culture using microfluidic systems and related activities include the following U.S. patent applications and non-patent literature, which, along with all citations therein, are incorporated herein by reference to provide background. A listing of these references here does not indicate the references constitute prior art.
Cytoplex, Inc. U.S. Pat. No. 6,653,124 “Array-based microenvironment for cell culturing, cell monitoring and drug-target validation.”
Cellomics, Inc. U.S. Pat. No. 6,548,263 “Miniaturized cell array methods and apparatus for cell-based screening.”
Fluidigm, Inc. Published Application 20040229349 (Nov. 18, 2004) “Microfluidic particle-analysis systems.”